In North Carolina, there are only a limited number of neonatal intensive care nursery beds. Our pediatric transport team is frequently called up on to transfer preemies and other critically ill neonates from hospitals around our region and as far away as Asheville to WakeMed’s Level IV Neonatal Intensive Care Nursery (NICU).

Our caregivers are also often called to rural hospitals that do not have the equipment or expertise to care for sick newborns or pediatric patients. The WakeMed Critical Care team often spends hours on the scene in the hospital working to stabilize the patient before transport, working with the referring and accepting physicians.

We continue to advance and improve our pediatric mobile critical care team. Just recently, we have integrated respiratory therapists onto our team, because especially in our neonate patients, airway management is their number one issue. And when our truck is not on the road, you can find the Mobile Critical Care team working on the hospital’s pediatric floors and NICU caring for patients and working closely with physicians, physician extenders and nurses.

Sean Gibson is a a manager of quality assurance with WakeMed Mobile Critical Care Services.